In our way to Bath we passed through several small towns that had been lately begun, and in these the houses were comfortable and neatly built; but the greater part of those of the farmers were wretched indeed; one at which we stopped for the night, in the course of our journey, had not even a chimney or window to it; a large hole at the end of the roof supplied the deficiency of both; the door was of such a nature, also, as to make up in some measure for the want of a window, as it admitted light on all sides. A heavy fall of snow happened to take place whilst we were at this house, and as we lay stretched on our skins beside the fire, at night, the snow was blown, in no small quantities, through the crevices of the door, under our very ears. At some of these houses we got plenty of venison, and good butter, milk, and bread; but at others we could get nothing whatsoever to eat. At one little village, consisting of three or four houses, the people told us, that they had not even sufficient bread and milk for themselves; and, indeed, the scantiness of the meal to which we saw them sitting down confirmed the truth of what they said. We were under the necessity of walking on for nine miles beyond this village before we could get any thing to satisfy our appetites. The fall of snow, which I have mentioned, interrupted our progress through the woods very considerably the subsequent morning; it all disappeared, however, before the next night, and in the course of the third day from that on which we left the banks of the Genesee River we reached the place of our destination. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ _LETTER _ XXXVII. _Account of Bath.—Of the Neighbourhood.—Singular Method taken to improve it.—Speculators.—Description of one, in a Letter from an American Farmer.—Conhorton Creek.—View of the Navigation from Bath downwards.—Leave Bath for Newtown.—Embark in Canoes.—Stranded in the Night.—Seek for Shelter in a neighbouring House.—Difficulty of procuring Provisions.—Resume our Voyage.—Lochartsburgh.—Description of the eastern Branch of the Susquehannah River.—French Town.—French and Americans ill suited to each other.—Wilkes-barré.—Mountains in the Neighbourhood.—Country thinly settled towards Philadelphia.—Description of the Wind-Gap in the Blue Mountains.—Summary Account of the Moravian Settlement at Bethlehem.—Return to Philadelphia._ Philadelphia, November. [Sidenote: BATH.]